Review of "Truffle Hound: On the Trail of the World's Most Seductive Scent with Dreamers, Schemers, and Some Extraordinary Dogs" by Rowan Jacobsen

Rowan Jacobsen is an award-winning American author who writes about nature, science, sustainability and food. Jacobsen has an agreeably jaunty writing style, and his narrative is fun-filled and sprinkled with popular references.

Author Rowan Jacobsen

In this book Jacobsen explores the world of truffles - aromatic underground fungi that resemble rough-skinned potatoes and grow in woodlands. In scientific terms, truffles are the subterranean fruiting bodies of filamentous fungi that have a symbiotic relationship with trees. The mycorrhiza (filaments) of the fungi transfer soil nutrients to trees, and the trees provide food for the fungi.


Truffles are underground fruiting bodies of filamentous fungi.

Truffles are culinary delicacies much prized by fine chefs and food cognoscenti; thus they're very much coveted and extremely expensive.


Chef Fabrizio Schenardi holding a plate of Alba white truffles.


Retail truffle prices in 2021

The most distinctive characteristic of a truffle is its scent, which stimulates delight and nostalgia in the human psyche. Jacobsen got his first sniff of a white truffle in a restaurant in northern Italy, and describes the fragrance as follows: "It was hardly a food scent at all. It was more like catching a glimpse of a satyr prancing across the dining room floor while playing its flute and flashing its hindquarters at you."


Rowan Jacobsen smelling a truffle.


Rowan Jacobsen compares the scent of a white truffle to a satyr prancing across the floor.

And a food writer portrayed the aroma of white truffles as "a combination of newly plowed soil, fall rain, burrowing earthworms and the pungent memory of lost youth and old love affairs." The perfume of white truffles has been described in more fathomable terms as having an "intense aroma of garlic, fried cheese, and gym socks"


White Truffles

Each variety of truffle has a unique fragrance, and the aromas are very variable. For instance, the smell of black winter truffles is characterized as "deep earth and forest floor, drenched in cocoa and cognac; layers of dried tobacco, sorghum and cured olive oil slowly unfold."


Black Winter Truffles

And Oregon white truffles have an aroma reminiscent of "a bouillabaisse of diesel [gas] and pine, mixed with salami, blue cheese, and a touch of model airplane glue."


Oregon White Truffles

The smell of truffles (apparently) appeals to animals as well as humans, because forest fauna dig them up and eat them, and truffle pigs and dogs trained to find truffles sometimes just scarf the fungi down themselves.


Pig rooting for truffles.

After Jacobsen's initial tantalizing whiff of the Italian white truffle, he decided he had to know everything about these subsurface delicacies, which - it turns out - grow all over the world. So for the next two years Jacobsen traveled to truffle-hunting regions, met truffle hunters and their truffle-sniffing dogs, joined truffle hunts, sampled foods flavored with truffles, interviewed mycologists, and had a rollicking good time.


Rowan Jacobsen with a giant truffle.

Jacobsen also researched the science of truffles and spoke to scientists and entrepreneurs trying to establish truffle farms. This is done by planting trees seeded with truffle spores and mycorrhizae, and is a very costly enterprise that takes years to bear fruit (so to speak).


Truffle farm

For his research Jacobsen traveled to Italy, Croatia, Hungary, Spain, England, the United States and Canada, and relates many stories about people he met, experiences he had, and anecdotes he heard. For instance, Jacobsen describes the start of the truffle industry in the town of Livade in Croatia as follows: One day in the 1920s, a local peasant brought a tavern owner a handful of ginger-colored tubers he's found in the woods and said, "Good day, sir, do you have any idea what these stinky potatoes are? I found them underground. My pigs love them. Too bad they're so repulsive." The tavern owner knew who to consult, the repulsive potatoes turned out to be very desirable truffles, and an industry was born.


Italy, Croatia, and Hungary have thriving truffle industries.


Truffle sellers at a market.


Truffle sales online

Though hunting and selling truffles is a legitimate occupation, it's still something of a clandestine industry in places, with deals going down in cash, in bars and parking lots....with flashlights examining the contents of car trunks. And in places like Hungary, truffle-hunting is reserved for privileged insiders who can afford to pay for licenses and permits. In fact truffle-hunting is a serious business in Hungary, which has a truffle museum, a Hungarian Federation of Truffling, Truffle Knights, a Patron Saint of Truffling (Saint Ladislaus), and a Grand Master of the Saint Ladislaus Order of Truffle Knights - a mycologist named Dr. Zoltán Bratek.


St. Ladislaus of Hungary


Dr. Zoltán Bratek is a Hungarian mycologist who's the Grand Master of the Saint Ladislaus Order of Truffle Knights.

Jacobsen describes going on a truffle hunt in Hungary, where he accompanied a truffle hunter called István Bagi and István's truffle dog Mokka, a black lab.


Istvan Bagi’s dog Mokka, a Labrador, searches for truffles in a forest near Jaszivany, east of Budapest.

Mokka is an exceptionally capable truffle dog who plunges into the woods, quickly returns to drop a black truffle into István's hand, then does it again. István tells the dog he doesn't want black truffles today, only whites, and the pooch promptly finds a poplar whose roots harbor white truffles, which István carefully digs out. Jacobsen writes, "For the next four hours, István and Mokka show me levels of truffle mastery I had no idea existed. Mokka crisscrosses the forest at a gentle canter, nose low, tail sweeping wide and slow....Through the day, the truffles keep coming. Big ones, small ones, stinky ones, but mostly nice and round ones." Truffle dogs are normally rewarded with lavish praise and treats, though Mokka occasionally rewards herself by eating a low-quality truffle István doesn't need.

Truffle hunting is big business, growing every day.....but inexperienced buyers should beware. For instance, in the 1990s some sellers mixed costly aromatic black truffles from southern Europe with unscented cheap (but similar looking) Chinese truffles, and charged top price. This scandal led to fines and a crackdown on the truffle industry.


Chinese Black Truffles

Folks who can't afford, or don't have access to real truffles, can flavor their food with cheap imitations - like truffle oils, salts, butters, sauces, honeys, zests, and so on.




Truffle products

Jacobsen uses these products on occasion and observes, "Every time, I regret it. The smell is a grotesque caricature of truffle, as subtle as a Yankee Candle store." The reason is that truffle oil has no truffle in it. It's just olive oil spiked with a synthetic chemical called 2,4-dithiapentane, which "gives a crude and heavy-handed impression of truffleness." Nevertheless, 'fake' truffle products are popular best-sellers in many circles.

For non-experts Jacobsen's book includes everything you want to know about truffles, including descriptions of different kinds of truffles; people in the truffle industry; tips for training truffle dogs; descriptions of truffle farming; resources for truffle experiences (truffle festivals and truffle hunts); and more. There are also lots of color photos and a helpful index at the end.


Monza is a Lagotto Romagnolo, a favorite breed for truffle hunting.


Margaret Townsend crisscrossing her family’s farm in Kentucky, following Monza, a truffle-sniffing dog hired for the day

This is a wonderfully entertaining and informative book for truffle novices and experts alike.

Some of the recipes in the book are:

Tarfufo Benedictus


Orange Salad with Truffle Vinaigrette


Chawanmushi Tartufi


Cacio e Pepe Con Tartufi Di Nero


Seared Scallops in Truffled Butter Broth


Truffle Duck


Tiramisu di Tartufi


Look yummy don't they?

Thanks to Bloomsbury Publishing for a copy of the book.

Rating: 4 stars